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INTRODUCTORY 

OUTLINE 



The 


Impromptu Talk-Plan 


By 

Benjamin Bills, Ph.B., J.D. 

w 

Formerly , Faculty Member Departments of Law, Political 
Science and Public Speaking, University of Chicago; 
Director of Oral English, Williams College, Mass¬ 
achusetts; Assistant Secretary in charge of Trust 
Company development, Continental and 
Commercial Banks. Now, President, 

Business Talk-Plan Company, Di¬ 
rector of Sales, American Bond 
and Mortgage Company ;Head, 

Department of Practical 
Speaking, School of Com¬ 
merce,Central Y.M. 

C.A., Chicago. 

Member of 
Chicago 
Bar. 



Published by the 


Business Talk-Plan Company 


One Two Seven North Dearborn Street 

Chicago 


1924 




Third Edition 


Copyright, 1914 

b 

Benjamin Bills 


FEB 15'24 





©C1A777145 


'wO 1 


Dedicated 

to 

The Memory of 

Beryl Gilbert Bills 

My loyal . and generous helpmate for seven 
precious years, carrying — as did I so grate¬ 
fully acknowledge in the first edition of these 
Talk-Plans in 1921—“many duties properly 
belonging to me in order that I might develop 
the Plans." 

And as I volunteered in the earlier edition, 
her experience in their teaching had "been-of 
incalculable assistance, as well as her aid in 
the phrasing and organizing of the points made." 

She is gone—departed at the summons of the 
Master Speaker—her pencil of suggestion on 
the pages that follow, laid aside for a bare six 
days — and then for a new and greater work 
surely begun for eternity. 

Benjamin Bills 


February first, 1924. 


























- 
































































' 








































































. 



















































Introductory Outline 

of 

THE IMPROMPTU TALK-PLAN 

« 


Part One 

Nature of the Impromptu Talk and Purpose of 
the Impromptu Talk-Plan 

Section One: Frequent Practical Occasion 
for Impromptu Talking: 


Business dividends 
in capacity to 
Talk Impromptu 


Impromptu talking is hair 
trigger talking. And it is 
what the bread and butter 
necessities of life demand. A new objection 
arises at a sale interview—impromptu thinking 
and talking right on the spot must be the means 
of overcoming this objection. A new angle 
arises at a business conference. Impromptu 
thinking and talking must at once work out a 
solution. On the “green carpet” before the 
chief, you must tell your side of the story then 
and there. At your lodge, your “few remarks” 
[71 


The Impromptu Talk-Plan 

can not be made after you get home. If you 
are at a convention and a motion is made, it is 
carried or defeated by impromptu remarks. If 
in the midst of a busy day, a letter comes in 
demanding a reply by return mail, you have no 
time to block out an answer and write and revise 
it in detail, for the outgoing mail leaves at an 
hour certain. 

In short, at your desk or on your feet, it is 
not sufficient merely to see a point quickly, but 
by impromptu talking or writing you must put 
it in words almost as quickly. Thus you have 
a practical occasion for realizing dividends on 
this impromptu ability every time you meet a 
man, every time you answer the telephone, every 
time you sit in on a decision, every time you 
attend a meeting and every time you dictate 
a letter. 

Section Two: Knowledge and experience 
essential even for Impromptu Talking: 

The Impromptu A baby carries on a continual 
substitute for chatter. He is talking and he 
information is talking impromptu. But he 

is just gibbering. If you are 
not going to gibber, you must, although talking 
impromptu, talk sense. No Talk-Plan of any 
[ 8 ] 


Introductory Outline 


sort can help you say anything if you have 
nothing to say. It merely helps you say well 
what you know well or have experienced well. 
In short, the Impromptu Talk-Plan is no sub¬ 
stitute for information. It merely provides you 
a method for quickly assembling and presenting 
your information in marketable form. 

Section Three: Three main uses of the 
Impromptu Talk Plan: 

(1) Steadies the xhe first use of this Talk-Plan 
S peaker | s stea( jy y OU so y OU are 

actually as effective as you are capable 
of being in any of these firing line occasions. 
A baseball pitcher is as capable of throw¬ 
ing a third strike when he has three balls 
and two strikes as is he when he has but one 
ball and two strikes. The additional two balls 
seldom weaken his skill. They merely deprive 
him of the steadiness necessary to give his skill 
equally certain play. 

The very same situation exists in being com¬ 
pelled to talk impromptu. Your mind is as 
good as it ever was, but often you get an attack 
of “nerves” and grow excited and wild. 

The Impromptu Talk-Plan actually takes 
the place of the catcher who walks out and pats 
[93 


The Impromptu Talk-Plan 

the pitcher on the back, gives him the signal as 
to just what corner of the plate the ball should 
cut, encourages him in doing exactly what he 
is able to do when at his best and who then holds 
up his big glove for the pitcher assuredly to 
shoot at and to shoot at straight. 

Why are most of us seldom at our best in the 
surprise occasion? The reason is that we are 
“flustered;” we are unsteadied by the unusual 
emergency. 

The Impromptu Talk-Plan braces you 
under fire. For, it gives you definitely Five 
Steps to take in your talking and you are always 
certain of what the next step is, when it is next, 
and why it is next. 

(2) Leads the The second use of the Impromptu 
L istener Talk-Plan is to lead rather 

than to drive your listener or reader to your 
conclusion and indeed to let him think out his 
own way to it. We all dislike a man who wants 
to tell us something. Yet we all hail the royal 
fellow who will quicken our own faculties of 
observing, comparing, reasoning and confirming, 
so that we, ourselves, can learn something. 
Thus, this second use of the Talk-Plan is to lead 
out your idea in your listener’s mind so that he 
[ 10 ] 


Introductory Outline 

actually believes it is his own idea. By this 
persuasive talking the purpose is accomplished 
of locking arms rather than horns over ideas. 

(3) Concentrates The catcher’s big glove helps 
both Speaker and ,, , . . 

Listener the P^cher concentrate his 

ball at a certain point. And 
such is the third use of the Impromptu Talk- 
Plan. It holds you to a concentrated attack. 
It prevents becoming “rattled.” It keeps you 
from scattering your points. Your shot-gun 
splatter is pulled together in rifle-ball boring. 

Before going to Part Two for a general de¬ 
scription of the Five Steps in this Talk-Plan, 
possibly its help in organizing your talking or 
dictating can be remembered best by recalling 
the story of the darky who was expertly flicking 
flies off the back of his mule with his raw hide 
much to the amusement of his passenger. 
As they passed under a limb of a tree from which, 
hung a hornet’s nest the passenger said, “Sambo, 
why don’t you make a snap at that hornet’s 
nest?” Came the retort supreme, “No, Boss, 
’dey’s organized.” 

It is to organize the appeals of your idea so 
that they teamplay that this Impromptu Talk- 
Plan has been prepared. 


[11] 


Part Two 


The Five Steps in the Impromptu Talk-Plan 


Section One A: 
Steps: 


In general on the Five 


Starting an Idea 
Sharp-End first 


Did you ever try to split wood 
using the blunt end of your 
wedge on the block? Obviously you can not 
split open the block unless you start your wedge 
sharp-end first. Yet, foolish as it may seem, 
most business speakers and sellers start their 
ideas in the stubborn mind of the listener or 
buyer blunt-e nd rather than sharp-end first. 


In the Five Steps of the Impromptu Talk- 
Plan it is proposed rather to do the common 
sense thing of trying to break into a man’s mind 
with an idea sharp-end first rather than snub- 
end first. Note the difference in ease of pene¬ 
tration in the diagram on next page of the 
wedge-idea as drawn in solid lines and as drawn 
in dotted lines. 


[12] 


Introductory Outline 

Then after an illustration of this difference, 
we actually shall break an idea apart, name the 
parts, and then assemble them so as to have 
them in sharp-end order. 

Once we have done this we can take all our 
ideas and thus break them apart and assemble 
them so as to make the surest headway by reason 
of having the least resistance. 



FIGURE A 

Illustration of Blunt- A young man who was em- 
End talking ployed in a large advertising 

agency once was presented an advertising plan 
which one of the clients of the agency had pre- 
[ 13 ] 




The Impromptu Talk-Plan 


pared and on which they wanted the judgment 
of the agency. The client was ushered in and 
turned over to this young man who began the 
interview thiswise: “Your plan is impractical. 
And it will lose you thousands of dollars.” 
The client, whose pet scheme this plan was, of 
necessity was quickly offended and reported the 
young man to his chief and the chief talked to 
the young man in the same language, saying, 
“As a business man you are impractical. You 
have lost us thousands of dollars in the loss of 
this client’s business.” And the young man lost 
his position. 


How an Idea grows How did the young man come 
Sharp-End first tQ t j ie conclusion that the 
client’s advertising campaign was impractical? 
Not by any God-given genius—but rather 
because, as he later explained it, another man 
with an identical plan tried it out with the loss 
of thousands of dollars whereas a plan built on 
practically identical lines with one or two dis¬ 
tinctive saving features made thousands of 
dollars. 


From these two observations, the suggestion 
was borne in the young man’s mind as to the 
importance of the advertising campaign, includ¬ 
ing the one or two distinguishing features which 
he had observed in the one successfully pros- 
[14] 


Introductory Outline 


ecuted. This suggestion he further reasoned out 
along the lines of psychology and of logic—in 
short, the “horse sense” of the suggestion which 
came to him appealed very strongly. And in his 
three or four years at the agency he had con¬ 
firmed the “horse sense” of this plan in “dollar- 
cents” by seeing other clients of the agency profit 
in following out the like features making for 
success. Therefore his conclusion as to the 
client’s different program, “Your plan is imprac¬ 
tical. It will lose you thousands of dollars.” 

And when the young man was asked why he 
did not allow his client to have the same basis 
for coming to the same conclusion, he rather 
freely confessed that probably it would have 
been better business, had he so done. 

This illustration surely must make clear the 
point that the vice in most of us is that we give 
the result first to our prospects and listeners to 
which our mind, nevertheless, has come last. 

Section One: In general on Step One: 

The “Cartoonist” j once tried to read an 
method of .tartmg editorial on “ S P end Your 

Vacation in the Country.” 
From its very first assertion to its last com¬ 
mand, I found myself disagreeing with it. 

[15] 


The Impromptu Talk-Plan 

As I flung the paper together my eye fell on 
a double-panelled cartoon. The top panel 
depicted a man clad in stuffy coat and high 
white collar, with stiffly starched cuffs to match 
and trousers that might have been white had 
one seen him sufficiently early in the morning. 
He was at the corner of State and Madison 
Streets, pocketed between a clanging street car, 
a screeching automobile, a racing truck and an 
irate policeman. He was trying to dodge north 
and south at one and the same time, while a 
hawking newsboy dinned in his ears, “Uxtra, 
uxtra, end of world, here.” Perspiration was 
oozing through his collar, his cuffs had become 
limp and his hair, on end. Heat waves were 
flaring down on him like the blasts of South 
Chicago furnaces with all drafts open. 

In the lower panel one beheld a vacationer 
stretched full length on a broad, old-fashioned, 
feather-ticked hammock swung between two 
whispering elms. Khaki informals with collar 
turned in and sleeves rolled up, along with a pair 
of afternoon slippers and a briar pipe, completed 
his attire. On his right was an old-fashioned 
windlass well. Beside it rested a deep white 
pitcher, beaded on the outside with great drops 
of perspiration betraying the cold nectar draft 
within. Dew berries sparkled on an old Dutch 
[ 16 ] 


Introductory Outline 

plate in easy reach to the left. Breezes bore the 
spice of fresh evergreens mingled with the clover 
sweetness of ripening hay. 

I called the cartoon to the attention of a neigh¬ 
bor on the train seat with me. Straightway we 
both began to consider rather cordially the 
advantages of a vacation in the country. 


Compared Illustra- Thus, not by challengeable 
trations, the Sharp- . . i . . . . 1 

End way of starting fssertion, but by undeniable 

an Idea illustration, does the cartoon¬ 

ist open our minds so much 
more readily than does the average editorial 
writer. And by the comparison of black against 
white, the skillful cartoonist makes the white 
appear whiter and black, blacker. 


Why not this suggestive comparison of success 
and failure by word as well as by crayon? Illus¬ 
trations cannot be questioned. Assertions will 
be. Illustrations will be listened to. Assertions 
will be broken into. Illustrations lead the mind 
to look and to listen, then to wonder, then to 
inquire and now and then to presume. Asser¬ 
tions close it too arbitrarily. 

Moreover, an impression coming through the 
senses is much less challenged than when pre¬ 
sented to the reason. What we see , for instance, 
[ 17 ] 


The Impromptu Talk-Plan 

we react on more readily and more confidently, 
than on what we are told. And this illustrative 
start to an idea by working on the senses of 
sight, sound, taste, smell and touch, stimulates 
the recording function of the mind which always 
is most responsive. 


Parallel-Comparison, Such illustrative material with 
the First Step 

a success set over against a 
relative failure comprises the sharp-end of the 
wedge-idea. And because the two instances 
should parallel each other, and because the like¬ 
nesses thus are compared , an appropriate name 
for this First Step is PARALLEL-COMPARI¬ 
SON. 



Suggestiveness of May we get this point fixed even 
PARALLEL- i i u -n . 

COMPARISON more clearly by one more illustra¬ 
tion? Suppose for instance, you 
come to my desk all enthused over a vacation 
which you are planning to take at Lake Geneva, 
Wisconsin. I will not accomplish my end very 
[ 18 ] 


Introductory Outline 

successfully of getting you to go to Lake Dela- 
van, Wisconsin, if at once I say, “You do 
not want to go to Lake Geneva. It is too 
formal for you and your family.” Involuntarily 
at least a resentment would flash through your 
mind at my presuming you not sufficiently cul¬ 
tivated to maintain your place in society at 
Lake Geneva. 

Suppose, however, instead of this blunt-end 
reply, I make no comment other than to draw 
from my desk drawer a snap-photograph of 
myself and family at Lake Geneva and in the 
Lake Geneva Hotel at a tea dance at which the 
extremely wealthy Shore residents were present. 

Through the window you discern—as is shown 
in shadowy outline in the snap-shot—the private 
yachts belonging to wealthy owners and along¬ 
side them drawn up on the beach was my catboat 
which I explain to you, I rented for the two weeks 
of stay. You note that while my wife’s gown 
was pleasing and attractive, yet you see that it 
was not of the dazzling magnificence and splendor 
paraded in peacock style by the Lake Shore ladies. 
While you can see that I was feigning a bored 
look of wealth and ease, yet you can observe that 
I was acting rather than living the part and that 
I was over my depth. 

[19] 


The Impromptu Talk-Plan 

Then suppose without making any further 
comment I also draw from my desk drawer a 
snap-shot of myself and family, likewise on a 
vacation, but this time a year later at Lake 
Delavan. 

Again you can see my rented cat-boat up on 
the beach, but beside it there were other cat- 
boats—some smaller but few larger. And all 
the boats were cat-boats. Suppose you also 
notice from the snap-shot that both my wife 
and I were dressed in bathing suits and that 
with a number of other people we were toasting 
marshmallows in front of a large bon-fire. You 
can see back on the lawns a number of small, 
modest cottages—but no society hotels. 

Then, having compared these two parallel 
snap-shots of vacation, environments, suppose I 
suggest, “Because of the greater informality 
possible at Lake Delavan, might you not con¬ 
sider its preference over Lake Geneva?” 

Quite clearly you would respond more favor¬ 
ably to this second illustrative presentation than 
to the first assertive presentation. 

Why so? Merely because this second time I 
start the idea in your mind in exactly the same 
way that it naturally developed in my own mind 
from the two experiences of the different vaca- 
[ 20 ] 


Introductory Outline 

tions in the two consecutive summers. Like¬ 
wise so presenting this PARALLEL-COM¬ 
PARISON to you of my actual experiences 
starts naturally and persuasively in your mind 
the same train and trend of thought. 

This description of the snap-shots of course, is, 
much longer than would or should be taken in 
a presentation. Indeed the presentation is not 
the description here given, but the snap-shots 
themselves. 

Personal experience One more question to make 

COMPARISON, the the P oint stlU clearer that 
way an Idea starts most ideas which make strong 
headway and certain head¬ 
way are borne in a PARALLEL-COMPARISON. 
Remind yourself for a moment as to how the idea 
started in your mind of being in your present 
business. 

Seldom was it because your parents so com¬ 
manded. Either you saw your father playing 
an attractive role in this business, or the work 
of the world as being done by a big brother 
came to you with a dramatic attractiveness at 
some time during your youth. Or a visitor or a 
speaker, being a member of a certain profession, 
gripped and held you with the worth while job 
he seemed to be performing. 

[ 21 ] 


The Impromptu Talk-Plan 

In short then, it must be doubly and trebly 
clear by this time that PARALLEL-COM¬ 
PARISON is the First Step and the entering 
wedge which most naturally opens a man’s mind 
to a courteous and cordial consideration of the 
SUGGESTION which we shall now consider as 
being the next wedge-part of an idea in the order 
of the ease of its reception by the listener. 


SUGGESTION, One of the preceding marginal 
the Second Step . . , , * <<e 

* notes is headed, Suggestiveness 

of PARALLEL-COMPARISON,” and it is 
exactly that which is done is this Second Step— 
that is to say, we name the two differences in the 
SUCCESS-ILLUSTRATION, but do so in an 
inquiring manner. No one would claim that 
two swallows make a summer although someone 
humorously has said that they break many a new 
year’s resolution. Likewise, merely two illus¬ 
trations alone do not drive a conclusion. How¬ 
ever, they do lead out a suggestion and SUG¬ 
GESTION is the name of the Second Step. 



[ 22 ] 


MIND 


Introductory Outline 


For instance, at the bottom of the cartoon on 
vacations, there was no assertive command, but 
rather the persuasive suggestion, “Comfort con¬ 
sidered, ought you not consider vacationing in 
the country?” 


Two Parts to And in this cartoonist’s language 
APPEAL and N * were contained the two parts 
PROPOSITION of this Second Step of SUG¬ 
GESTION, namely, (1) the 
APPEAL for action your way; (2) the PRO¬ 
POSITION of the action itself. 


Recall the reasoning of the young advertising 
man to himself after he had seen the two 
different advertising practices, namely, “Profit 
considered, might not the advertising containing 
my two features embrace the sounder policy?” 
Are you clear now that the Second Step comprises 
SUGGESTION which has two parts—(1) MAIN 
APPEAL for the proposition and (2) the 
PROPOSITION, itself? 


Section Three: In general on Step Three: 

Probability of From the two PARALLEL- 

in^the Third*step ILLUSTRATIONS, the appeal 
of your proposition is seen as 
possible. In the Second Step of SUGGESTION 
[23] 


The Impromptu Talk-Plan 

you word its possibility. Now you come in this 
Third Step to establishing its probability. 

If one type of fuse in your switch board burns 
out a couple of times, whereas another type of 
fuse continually has been effective, the sug¬ 
gestion comes to you in a tentative way that 
possibly the latter type of fuse is preferable. 
You take it out and begin to look it over, seeking 
to discover whether there is any plausible reason 
for its superiority. 


EXPLANATION of This Third Step of showing 
step plausible reasons for the AP¬ 

PEAL very properly can be 
called EXPLANATION. For, explaining is 
exactly what is done in this Third Step. It still 
continues the purpose of “locking arms rather 
than horns,” because Explanation as distin¬ 
guished from Argumentation seeks to get people 
to see rather than to agree. And we all do want 
to be intelligent enough to see and yet we all 
are stubborn in disliking to agree. 


Illustration of the Suppose an automobile salesman 
Third Step . . . 

is representing a low swung type 

of car. He decides one sale appeal for his car 
is the comfort of its riding quality. 

[24] 


Introductory Outline 

Listen to his talk: “Take a four-inch pencil, 
each inch representing a foot. Three inches 
represent the three-foot height of my car—four 
inches, the four-foot height of my competitor’s 
car. Imagine yourself in the high car at the 
top of the pencil. You hit a rut, which swings 
the pencil, say, a 30 degree angle at the bottom. 
At the top in the high car, you are swung two 
and a quarter inches. Drop down to the low 
car and the arc of your swing is reduced near to 
one and three-quarter inches. That is to say, 
the wrench of the passenger by hitting the same 
rut is close to sixty per cent, less in the low 
swung car.” 

“Oh, I see,” often has said the listener to this 
demonstration sale of the low swung car. 

The listener’s guard thus is down as he seeks 
to see. His guard would be up if he were asked 
to agree. Such is the work of this Third Step of 
EXPLANATION. 



[25] 



The Impromptu Talk-Plan 

Section Four: In general on Step Four: 

CONFIRMATION, At this stage of your talk or 
the Fourth Step solicitation the listener already 
has observed the possibility of truth from your 
PARALLEL-COMPARISON and SUGGES¬ 
TION. He has considered its plausibility as you 
have worked it out in your EXPLANATION. 
He now naturally wishes to be assured of its 
actuality and this Fourth Step which confirms the 
impression the listener or reader has been get¬ 
ting is appropriately called CONFIRMATION. 

The expanding wedge-idea which we are using 
to illustrate the gradual pushing of our idea into 
the other man’s mind with the least possible 
resistance on his part as thus added to by this 
Fourth Step of CONFIRMATION is as follows: 



Section Five: In general on Step Five: 

CONCLUSION, the By this time we have devel- 
Fifth Step , . , f 

oped our idea for our prospect 

or listener from the possibility of its soundness to 

[26] 



Introductory Outline 


its probability and on through to its actuality , 
and now we come to its finality in the CONCLU¬ 
SION. 

This CONCLUSION is the very same proposi¬ 
tion which we stated in the form of a SUGGES¬ 
TION in the second step, but this time we can 
state it not suggestively, but conclusively. 

The function of the CONCLUSION is to put 
dress suit clothes on the points of EXPLANA¬ 
TION which in the Third Step were given in the 
language of business dress. The CONCLU¬ 
SION gives snap and zest and drive to the 
points of the EXPLANATION. 

Thus the completed idea-wedge in the order 
of the ease with which it will be received by the 
listener or reader appears thiswise: 



Summary of I n summary, the order of the steps 
Five Steps j n the easy and sure wedging of an 
idea to acceptance is: 

[27] 



The Impromptu Talk-Plan 


1. PARALLEL—COMPARISON, illustrating success of 
speaker’s PROPOSITION as compared with an 
opposing one. 

2. SUGGESTION of APPEAL for speaker’s PROPO¬ 
SITION and then suggestion of the PROPOSITION, 
itself. 

3. EXPLANATION of APPEAL. 

4. CONFIRMATION of each explanatory point. 

6. CONCLUSION, a summary of the explanatory points 
for the APPEAL, and its proof of the PROPOSITION. 

Hand Diagram In brief, you compare, suggest , 


explain , confirm , conclude. In 


the detached hand diagram here inserted these 
Five Steps are worked out, along with the sub¬ 
divisions of each. This detached diagram should 
be carried forward as you study through each of 
the seven books, so that if at any time you get 
confused as to what the steps are or in which 
step you are for the moment, you can clear the 
whole matter up for yourself by reference to this 
hand diagram of the Five Steps as disclosed on the 
five fingers. 


Illustrative 
application of 
Five Steps 


We have earlier referred to the use 
by a railroad traffic manager of 
this Impromptu Talk-Plan. Pos¬ 


sibly the best way to end this Introductory 
Outline from the point of view of giving a clear 
understanding of how the Five Steps can be used, 


[281 


Introductory Outline 


is through printing the speech of this traffic 
manager to his directorate, according as steno¬ 
graphic write-up shows it to have been given. 
The beginning of each step will be noted by a 
descriptive marginal index. 

Also note how the second use of this Talk- 
Plan, i. e., that of “leading the listener,” is here 
accomplished. The directors are given little 
or no opportunity to say “no” in the first two 
steps and by that time the presumption already 
is resolved the speaker’s way. 

It should be known in advance that this 
was a talk requesting an appropriation for a new 
block system which, however, the traffic man¬ 
ager was warned a year earlier he could not 
have installed for five years on the second 
branch of his road—he having at that time 
secured an appropriation for its installation on 
the first branch of his road. This railroad 
speech follows: 

SPEECH TO DIRECTORATE BY RAILROAD 

EXECUTIVE ASKING FOR ADDITIONAL 
APPROPRIATION 

PARALLEL- “Gentlemen, when I first 

COMPARISON received your summons 

to come back to this con¬ 
ference on budget plans, I had just come in 

[29] 


The Impromptu Talk-Plan 

from a trip on our Northern Branch from the 
first wreck that had occurred there this year. 
We spent $100,000 last year on that branch, 
you recall, for a block system to prevent 
wrecks. This single wreck, which would 
have happened no matter what block system 
we had, was its record for the year. 

“I called for my wreck records on the 
Southern branch in order to have a complete 
report for you. For the same year we had 
had 12 wrecks, which, although our hauls 
are mostly freight, cost us more than $10,000 
each in money, not to speak of a much 
greater loss in business, together with ship¬ 
pers’ claims, bad newspaper publicity, expen¬ 
sive litigation. You know, indeed, the train 
of costly consequences. 

“In an effort to locate the reason for this 
remarkably good showing on our Northern 
branch as contrasted with the deplorably bad 
situation on the Southern branch I changed 
maintenance gangs from one branch to the 
other for two months with no change in 
record. I changed station agents with no 
change in record. I changed engine crews 
with no change in record. We have the 
same train dispatchers on both branches— 
have spent practically the same amount of 
money on both branches, a little more on 
the Southern, except for the $100,000 outlay 
for the block system on the Northern. 

“And yet one wreck on the Northern to 
twelve on the Southern; $6,000 cost in 

[30 ] 


Introductory Outline 

wrecks on the Northern, $110,000 cost in 
wrecks on the Southern. 

SUGGESTION “By reason, gentlemen, 
of the apparent wreck 
reduction resulting, might we not consider 
the wisdom of at once installing this new 
block system on our Southern branch? 

EXPLANATION “Speaking in the ver¬ 
nacular, you know that 
it is ‘human to take a chance.* When you 
branched out from the steel business into 
this belt line, you took a chance. 

“Imagine a train and crew stopped by the 
red signal of our old fashioned block system. 
In obedience, they wait 5, 10, 15 minutes. 
The signal still shows red. They wait 20, 
25, 30 minutes. The signal still grimaces 
red. 

“The engineer and conductor recall the 
admonition of the chief dispatcher that if 
late again, they will be laid off again. What 
do they do? Being human, they go in 
slowly and carefully—they ‘take a chance.* 

“And nine times out of ten, the train in 
the next block is at the other end going out 
and the chance is safely taken. But, the 
tenth time a switch still is open—a caboose 
is loose and this tenth time, oats and coal 
and lard and machinery are omeletted on 
the side track and we all have addled brains. 

[31] 


The Impromptu Talk-Plan 

“Suppose that we had the block system 
so contrived as to make it mechanically 
impossible for two trains to get into the same 
block at one and the same time. Precisely 
this is done by the new block system’s set 
of control batteries—which depend on the 
human element only in so far as the keeping 
of them charged is concerned. They throw 
the engineer’s brakes against his lever— 
they lock him up until the pressure of the 
train in the next block is removed. 

CONFIRMA- “Pretty mechanical 

TION theory? Yes, but it works 

as prettily. You all know 
the catastrophic record of the New York, 
New Haven and Hartford Railroad in the 
East—until recently, yellow journal-sheeted 
from New York to Chicago to Frisco— 
because of what? Wrecks! Mellon, the 
company’s President, was called before 
Congress for investigation because of his 
wrecks. 

“Yet in the past thirteen months, but two 
freight wrecks have been chronicled on the 
road, and they were unavoidable. And this 
retrieving record has been accomplished by 
what? Many factors doubtless, but one 
large factor was the installation of this new 
block system on their road sixteen months 
ago. 

“You directors complain to me about 
losing too many freight hauls to the- 

[32] 



Introductory Outline 

Railroad. And, in turn, I complain to my so¬ 
licitors. I caught a glimpse of against what 
they were competing the other day while 
down on a lobbying matter at Springfield, 
Illinois. The trial attorney of this competing 
line approached me with a proposition for 
doing also our trial work. His explanation 
was that the installation of a new block 
system—the very one we have on our 
Northern branch—had lessened the number 
of damage cases for him to handle. 

Then I appreciated my solicitors’ lament 
about not being able to present the same 
freedom from wreck record which their 
competitors boasted. And to some degree, 
I understood the reason for our not getting 
our share of freight haulage. 

“Convincing facts? Hold your conclusion 
in abeyance if you at all fear their sufficiency. 
For, I have for you the confirming knowledge 
of a man who always had sound theory and 
cumulative data at his hands before author¬ 
izing even a nominal outlay. 

“James Hill sent me to you from his road, 
you remember. Three years ago, when still 
he was living, he invited me to lunch with 
him in the traffic rooms of the Hotel La 
Salle, just prior to my coming with you. In 
the course of the conversation, he said to 

me: ‘Peter, you are going to the- 

Road as my protege. I want you to make 
good. Remember, you must spend money 

[33] 



The Impromptu Talk-Plan 

in order to make money.’ A platitude said 
alone? True. But he had just read to me 
the carbon of a telegram—in relation to 
what? The installation of this same new 
block system on every mile of his Great 
Northern Railway! 

CONCLUSION “In short, Gentlemen, our 
own back door yard ex¬ 
perience with this block device, the ex¬ 
perience in its use in the East, in the West, 
in the North—the sound operating principle 
underlying its operation, the actual demon¬ 
stration of its money saved in one year in 
wreck prevention on our own lines, move 
me most earnestly and unequivocally to 
recommend its immediate installation on 
our Southern Branch.” 

This traffic manager—now general super¬ 
intendent of this road'had the courtesy to wire 
me from New York that his recommendation 
was allowed. 


[34] 


Introductory Outline 

Value of the Companion Books in this Set 

When a boy, a chum of mine came running 
into my home one day with a new pair of skates, 
eagerly inviting me to accompany him to the 
ice-pond. 

“Why, Floyd,” my mother protested, “I did 
not know you could skate.” 

“Oh, yes,” retorted the lad, “I have stood on 
the bank and watched them skate many a time.” 

However, as you might well guess, Floyd 
received many hard bumps when he came 
actually out on the ice. 

You here have read the development of the 
Five Steps in this Impromptu Talk-Plan. 
Obviously your use of them in a really skillful 
way is going to be possible only as you substitute 
for the telescope used in this Introductory 
Outline, the microscope which we shall now use 
as we consider each one of the Steps separately 
and then all together again in the next five 
companion books. 

In this Introductory Outline, you have part 
of the theory for locking arms as against locking 
horns over ideas. But successful application of 
this Talk-Plan can come only after you have 
had more than this passing acquaintance. 

In the next Five Books you will acquire the 
intimate understanding of each of the Five 
[35] 


The Impromptu Talk-Plan 

Steps necessary for their effective use—each 
step being worked out in a separate book. You 
will learn of the relation of the steps to each other 
and of how you can vary them and how you can 
apply them on specific problems of getting a 
new position, asking for an increase in salary, 
getting a report approved, closing a sale, han¬ 
dling a complaint. 

In short, you can acquire the ability to 
“think on your feet” in meeting any emergency 
any time, any where. 

Moreover, Part Two in each of these Five 
Books comprises a series of searching questions 
referring you back to the specific sections in 
which their answer is to be found. And even 
of greater value are the practical cases in Part 
Two of each book, putting squarely up to you 
how to handle a lodge talk, a specific sales objec¬ 
tion, a business recommendation, etc. And 
most important of all, after you have worked out 
each case, you can go to the appendix of each 
book and find there how the author, himself, has 
worked out each practical case given you. Thus 
without any dread routine of lessons or corres¬ 
pondence, you at once can measure your own 
effectiveness and determine how to multiply it. 

Moreover, there is a seventh book, in which 
practical application is made of the steps in 
[36] 


Introductory Outline 


almost every sort of practical business situation, 
in soliciting insurance, in lawyer’s trial work; in 
merchandising, including the marketing of cloth¬ 
ing, shoes, specialties, groceries; in fraternal 
talking; in social service appealing; in financial 
reviews; in railroad problems; in real estate; in 
investments; in sales correspondence. 

Understand that on each one of these problems 
and others, a specific and complete application 
of the Talk-Plans is made and is made by 
experts in their line who themselves, have taken 
the Talk-Plans. Thus their actual application of 
the Talk-Plans to their own desk and audience 
problems is made available to you. 

And by aid of these illustrations you very 
readily learn how to apply this Impromptu Talk- 
Plan to your practical business problems. In¬ 
deed, because this seventh book includes almost 
every kind and type of business talk, it is very 
probable that you will find your own field covered. 

In short, in the next Five Books following this 
one and in the last book of practical applica¬ 
tions, you can get off the bench and pitch ball 
yourself. You do more than appreciate these 
organization principles; you learn quickly to 
master and to demonstrate them, with personal 
satisfaction and business profit alike accruing 
to you. 


[37] 






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